


The Annual Tradition

by not_rude_ginger



Series: Aimless Play Series [4]
Category: Norse Religion & Lore, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Loki Has Issues, Thor Feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-18
Updated: 2014-09-18
Packaged: 2018-02-17 22:00:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,587
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2324648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/not_rude_ginger/pseuds/not_rude_ginger
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thor always looks forward to his birthday -but not for the reason everyone might think.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Annual Tradition

**Author's Note:**

> Set in the early years after Angrboda and the loss of Loki's children.

Thor paced in his chambers, glancing at the door every few minutes, and then heaving an impatient sigh. He never knew when Loki would come on this night. Sometimes he had waited until dawn to make an appearance, other times Thor had left dinner to find Loki waiting for him, tapping his foot as if Thor was the inconsiderate one.

Thor never dared complain, in case any argument cost him this one night with his brother when everything was good.

Today was his birthday, and while it would only be noticed by the realm every fifty years now that he was an adult, it was celebrated every year with a private dinner with his parents, his brother and his close friends. Yet Thor did not consider his birthday complete until he saw Loki. He stopped pacing and looked at the door, sighing when it remained closed.

“You’re wearing a trench in the floor.”

Thor jumped and span around. Loki smirked at him from where he was impossibly perched on the corner of Thor’s wardrobe.

“Loki! Do not sneak up on my like that, what if I had attacked you?”

Loki smirked, “Then you would be the fool and I would have all the cakes.”

Thor gave him a rueful smile and stepped closer, reaching up to his brother. Loki huffed, but unfolded his long legs and tipped into Thor’s hands. Thor set him down on his feet and decided once again his brother was too thin, he could feel every rib. But commenting never got him anywhere, so he simply let go and watched as Loki pulled a small basket from the air and set it down on Thor’s bed, climbing on after it.

“Come on, I didn’t go to this trouble for you to stand idle,” Loki snapped. Thor quickly jumped onto the bed and grinned as Loki was unseated by the force. “Oaf,” Loki grumbled, reseating himself and folding his legs in again. He opened the basket and held it out to Thor. “Go on, stuff your face.”

“I intend to brother,” said Thor, taking out a small cake and biting most of it away. Loki took one for himself and broke it in half, then into quarters. He bit one piece in half.

They were quiet for a while, slowly getting through the stolen sweets. Thor glanced at Loki more than once, trying to read his face. But for years now, his brother was as impossible to read as a blank wall.

“So… how are your studies going brother?”

Loki looked up at him, arching an eyebrow at him.

“Why do you ask?”

“I’m curious.”

“Really?”

Thor nodded, wishing he hadn’t asked now. The suspicion in Loki’s voice made him feel like he had made a terrible mistake.

“Well, I’m currently studying the principles of runic magic being interpreted through numerology, and trying to determine if such principles can be used to manipulate the intentions of certain potions.”

Thor blinked and Loki gave him a nasty smirk, “Sorry you asked now?”

“No,” said Thor easily. That shut Loki up for a moment. As he picked up another cake, the younger brother sighed and said,

“I’m trying to see if I can achieve results through a potion that normally I’d need to write a whole spell in runes to get. If I can bottle them, I can use them instantly, rather than wasting time.”

“How is that going?”

Loki crumbled his cake, “It’s not.”

“Well, maybe you could just smash your enemy and be done with it.”

Loki snorted and licked his fingers clean. “Oaf.”

“Sometimes I worry you make things too complicated Loki.” Thor could hear his voice going into its ‘scolding older brother’ tone, but he couldn’t help it. “Sometimes it is better to do the simple thing and be done with it. Otherwise you might be hurt.”

“And?” Loki challenged, his green eyes, which were now a poisonous colour instead of the vivid green they had been before he vanished over a decade ago.

“And I would not want to see you hurt. Nor would father or mother,” said Thor promptly.

Loki pulled a strange expression, the way he always did at the mention of their parents. Thor had no idea what secret the three were keeping about Loki’s five year disappearance that could be so terrible, but it had caused a deep rift between them where mother’s eyes had been red from crying, father had been sombre and sad and Loki had lost more weight than Thor could have imagined possible, even for Loki.

“I can look after myself,” Loki sniffed, shoving a lock of hair behind his ear.  

“Just because you can doesn’t mean I won’t worry about you.” Thor shook his head, reaching out and clasping Loki by the neck. “You’re my little brother. I will always worry about you.”

Loki lifted his eyes and looked straight at Thor, looking younger than he had in a long time. When he looked like that, Thor longed to ask him what happened in the five years he had been missing.

Loki narrowed his eyes and the next thing Thor knew, he got a face-full of cake. He snorted as crumbs flew up his nose and he swiped at his face frantically. 

“Loki!”

Loki grinned at him, and then vanished. Thor wiped his face and looked around, smirking when he spotted the black kitten trying rather unsuccessfully to find a way off the bed.

“Oh no you don’t!”

Thor pounced and grabbed Loki by the scruff of the neck, lifting him up into the air. Loki mewled in protest and clawed the air.

“Ha! I’ve learned better brother. And I’m not putting you down until-”

Loki hissed, twisted and turned back into himself, managing to knock Thor over in the process.

“Blasted bed was too high!” he growled, pushing Thor down and trying to clamber over him to escape. Thor swung an arm out, caught Loki by the waist and dragged him back.

“Say you're sorry brother.”

“No!” Loki squirmed against Thor’s hold. Thor grinned and dug his fingers into Loki’s ribs, earning a squeak. “No Thor, stop it!”

“Nay brother, not until you say you’re sorry.”

Loki squealed in outrage and kicked ferociously, pounding on Thor’s shoulders with helpless fists. “Stop it! I’ll turn you into a frog!”

“It is my birthday, you wouldn’t dare.”

“Don’t count on it!” Loki smacked at Thor’s head, but there was no real force because the tickling was exhausting him. “I’ll turn you into a frog and leave you in the nearest pond for the children to catch and take home. You’ll spend the rest of your days in a bucket!”

“Ha!” Thor laughed and grabbed Loki’s ankle, pulling his foot close and attacking the arch. Loki shrieked and twisted, kicking Thor hard in the stomach. Thor tumbled right off the bed and groaned as he smacked his head on the stone floor. He lay there for a moment, dazed.

“Are you dead?” asked Loki, peering at him from above, “Am I Crown Prince now?”

Thor snorted and sat up, rubbing his head as he pulled himself back onto the bed. “You wish little brother.”

“Not in the slightest,” said Loki with a shudder, “Take your throne, I have no interest in it. And look, you’ve squashed the basket!”

Thor huffed and dug out a crushed cake, “They still taste good.”

“Of course, I took the best ones,” said Loki with a smirk. They ate in companionable silence for a few minutes, until Thor reached into his drawer and pulled out his whistle. Loki wrinkled his nose at the sight of it. “Still practising I see.”

Thor grinned and blew three notes on the whistle, “I’m getting better.”

“One can only hope.” Loki rubbed at his ear.

Thor grinned as an idea popped into his head, “Why don’t I play and you sing? I know some of the songs we used to sing as boys.”

Loki went very still and his expression flattened into nothing. Thor’s grin faded at once. He knew that look, it was the look Loki had gotten last month when Öndóttr Freyrsson had called him a delicate maiden, the one he had gotten last year when Tyr had demanded to know where Loki had learned all his new, dark, magic. It never led anywhere good, Öndóttr had turned up in a ditch, having been unseated from his exceptionally placid horse, and become trapped in the water and brambles that seemed to have wrapped themselves around him. It had taken three days to find him. Tyr had been humiliated in front of the Vanir ambassador when he had attempted to demonstrate his swordsmanship and he kept dropping it. There was no proof, but everyone had learned to connect that expression on Loki’s face to later misfortune.

“Actually,” said Thor quickly, “I’ve not gotten good enough to match your voice, it would ruin it.”

Loki nodded, eyes glassy as he rubbed some cake between his fingers, crumbling it into greasy specks. Thor carefully put the whistle away and picked up a cake, shoving it into his mouth to keep him from speaking. He should have been more careful, this week he had seen almost nothing of Loki, the younger Ás spending all his time locked in his chambers, with Frigga murmuring ‘He’s having a bad week,’ to Thor when he had asked. Thor hated bad weeks, they were like blankets of misery that fell over the Royal Family, reminding him over and over that he was the only one who didn’t know why they happened.

Frigga would give him a tight smile and say, “It’s up to Loki to tell you, and if he doesn’t, you must do what you can to help anyway.”

Odin would say, “It’s best you don’t know, Loki doesn’t want anyone to know.”

Loki would say, “Leave me alone! It’s none of your business.”

Thor wanted to say, “Don’t leave me out, I want to help, I want to know, let me in.”

He never did.

Loki blinked and sucked on a fingertip slowly, still lost in his head. Then he looked up at Thor and said,

“Do you think father will wait until you’ve started a family to make you king?”

Thor blinked at the change of subject, then shrugged, “I don’t know, I suppose it depends on how long he waits to make me king.”

“You should have a family first, then become king,” said Loki, still cleaning his fingers.

“Why?”

“Because you have duties as a prince… think of how much busier you’ll be as king.”

Thor shrugged, “I’ll make time, like father does.”

Loki snorted and shoved a huge piece of cake into his mouth, as if to quell any nasty comments. Thor’s birthday was the only day he would do so. Once he’d swallowed, Loki said softly,

“Tyr was pleased with you today.”

Thor grinned, “I know, I even got a smile from him.”

“A rare thing indeed.”

“If you want, I could help you get the same, with a bit of extra training,” said Thor, reaching out and resting his hand on the nape of Loki’s neck. “You deserve it.”

Loki gave the blanket under them a twisted smile, “If I deserve it, then I shouldn’t need your help in getting it.”

“Loki I just-”

Loki’s hand came up and squeezed Thor’s wrist, keeping his hand in place, “I know, but I can’t earn such a thing with your help. I have to do it my own way.”

Thor didn’t think Loki’s way would help him, but he said, “You look tired, come here.”

Loki leaned away from his pulling hands but Thor was able to tug him until Loki was resting his head on Thor’s lap, curled up lightly as he nibbled on more cake and Thor tried not to spill crumbs in his hair.

“I’m not a baby Thor,” he said after a while but he made no move to pull away. Thor smiled faintly,

“You are not, you’re a man, a man I am proud to call my brother.”

Loki snorted again, although at what, Thor wasn’t sure. “Shut up and eat your cake.”

Thor chuckled and deliberately bit into his cake over Loki’s head so crumbs fell in his hair. Loki growled at him, but didn’t move.

They talked idly for the rest of the night, until Thor slumped over and fell asleep, Loki still curled up with him. When Thor woke up, it was to find a small, black kitten batting at his chin playfully, bright green eyes smirking at him as he glared.

“Lo-kiiii!”

Loki shook his little body and rolled onto his back, exposing his furry belly. Thor could do nothing but oblige the request, rubbing the belly until Loki was purring like a motor. Thor was relieved no one would come upon them like this, he didn’t want anyone to know his brother was in the habit of shifting his form, it would not be taken well by their peers. Thor would not admit that he rather liked his brother’s ability, Loki as a kitten was much easier to deal with than Loki the Ás sometimes. All Loki wanted as a kitten was a belly rub, Loki in his true form was prickly, tense and angry these days. Except on Thor’s birthday, when he would set much of that aside, just for Thor.

Feeling a rush of affection, Thor scooped the kitten up and held him close to his chest, ignoring the sudden pinch of claws digging into his arm.

“If you take the claws away, I’ll let you lie on my neck for a while,” he murmured. The claws retracted, and Thor sat up, letting Loki climb up his arm and drape himself across his neck. Thor spent some time reading a book while Loki purred and rubbed his head against Thor’s cheek to demand petting. When the sun finally brightened the sky, Loki slipped off Thor’s shoulders and padded away to the door.

“Loki wait,” Thor called. The kitten paused and turned his head back to Thor. Thor wanted to say he was grateful for this tradition, he wanted to say he wished Loki would spend time with him like this more often, that they could restore their boyhood connection once more. He wanted to say that Loki could tell him anything and Thor would love him anyway, just please tell him what had happened in the five years he’d been gone.

The kitten shivered and Loki grew out of it, eyeing Thor warily. Thor swallowed and smiled at his brother,

“I’ll see you next year brother.”

Loki snorted, “I’ll see you in a few hours.”

Thor leaped off the bed and crashed into Loki as he threw his arms around him, squeezing tight. Loki stiffened, then rested his head on Thor’s shoulder for a brief moment, then he squirmed away.

“Fool,” he murmured, smiling faintly. He slipped free from Thor and left the room. Thor stared at his door for a moment, then glanced at the bed, where the basket was still sitting. He picked it up and held it for a moment, smelling the lingering sweetness, then he went to his wardrobe and put the basket in the back, where it would sit and wait for another year until it disappeared the day before his birthday and he would know Loki was coming to see him, and he would spend the whole day full of anticipation.

It was absolutely worthwhile. 

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoy my work please feel free to [buy me a cup of coffee](http://ko-fi.com/notrudeginger)


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